Sunday Profile - Diane Robertson

Saturday, 19 September 2015

Outside the City Mission, the stubbled clientele huddle over their coffee and chain smoke cigarettes. They are there for the daily breakfast rush – hot drinks with toast and spreads. They come for food parcels, camaraderie and referrals to other services.

It's a place that welcomes those who have nowhere else to go. The Mission is seen as a unique sanctuary, a haven from the troubles outside its doors, and those who use its services are closely guarded by a tight-knit team of staff led by Dame Diane Robertson.

A lot has changed at the Mission in the two decades that have spanned  Robertson's career. Staffing has grown from 15 to a current tally of 85 since she began as social services manager and the pressures of managing a workforce that size have taken away from the job she truly wants to do. The unexpected and sudden loss of a younger colleague to cancer was the final push she needed to hand in her resignation, to grasp life and live it to the fullest.

Her staff describe her as a direct and hands-on boss who takes no prisoners and always speaks her mind. If you do anything wrong under her watch, you will hear about it. At the same time she's seen as approachable and compassionate in equal measure.

Though she might describe herself as just a 'blip on the landscape' in the organisation's history, to her family of staff she embodies so much of what the Mission stands for and her departure will bring with it a degree of uncertainty.

But  Robertson is craving more peace and quiet. A new chapter will mean she can explore smaller projects where she can be more involved at the ground level and the building stages.

It won't all be work of course, a new grandchild is on the way at the end of the year – her fifth from three children. There will be family time and there is her new love for ballet and pilates. 'I always wanted to do ballet, I'm a late starter I realise, but It's a really great form of exercise. Because I have never done it, I have to use my mind. I have to follow instructions. It's just totally engrossing time, which is good because my brain is really firing all the time. I'm always thinking about something. I'm always planning something, thinking about new projects and staffing.

'I wake up in the middle of the night with ideas … I want to spend more of my time just being.'

This new found freedom of sorts will also bring time for her garden, a never-ending labour of love, which she shares a passion for with her husband of  40 years, Wilf Holt, a personality in the city's social services in his own right.

There will be longer walks and more time for her grizzly bear of a dog, Zoya, a 53-kilogram Black Russian terrier which keeps her grounded, stops her languishing until late at night in her office and gets her out and about for 8km of walking each day.

 Robertson and Holt dote on this placid and cuddly beast which came first in class at her puppy school, goes to doggy daycare and makes frequent appearances at the Mission.

The couple met 40 years ago when she was a young teacher at Waiouru Army camp and he was in the army – at the time there were 3000 single men and eight single women at Waiouru.  Robertson describes those years as a 'fun time'.

The secrets to her marriage aren't complex, she and her husband have given each other the space and respect to grow and find each other independently, something that hasn't waned as they've got older.

This year Holt is off to Ethiopia for a five-week solo stint – just because he has always wanted to.  'I don't ask him to come to ballet and he doesn't ask me to come to church. We both have a huge respect for each other. That's 40 years of trying to figure that out, we have both allowed each other to do the things that we want to do. We have got a great partnership and relationship and we also have great independence.'

Recently while celebrations in honour of her Queen's Birthday gong were under way, Holt made an emotional speech to his wife in front of family. Second-born son Mathieu Holt says the pride in his dad's eyes was clear to everyone as was the emotion his mum was feeling. 'She was just buzzing.'

Holt is proud his mother is so well known with the homeless at the Mission, the philosophies of which run deep in the family's blood. At 35, Holt reflects on a childhood spent in constant service to those 'who have come from bad places' – all the family have worked or volunteered at the Mission at one point or another and all have spent many Christmases at the famous City Mission lunch which serves thousands. 'People think you miss out on Christmas but I think that's the only way to have a Christmas day. She was always first in and last to leave. It's really second nature for us, we don't think of it as helping.'

Though the family is looking forward to a Christmas at home from now on, Holt doesn't see his mother taking it easy. 'I don't think there's anything stopping her. She's just that determined person, if she slows down she gets bored. She's got a really creative mind.'

As the youngest of five children from a blended family with an alcoholic father and a history of abuse, she is frank about the rough time she had growing up and has spoken publicly about it numerous times.  'I have seen how people judge you and how people put you in boxes and decide that you're of value or not of value and judge you by your family.

'I'm one of those lemmings that keeps throwing themselves at a wall. I don't like giving up . I have a resilience in me which I had as a child to keep going. When I was growing up, we didn't get a lot of choices about what we did as a woman…My family thought I would just get married at 17 and have children but I became a teacher and that's sort of how life worked out.'

Her early stints as a teacher and counsellor were all relatively short term, she never expected to fall into a role she would hold onto for more than two decades. The Mission's diversity of jobs has kept her interested, but the fact that she has to tread so lightly over so many projects will see her leave.

Her appointment as chief executive was controversial in some of the more conservative circles at the time - as the first woman in the role and first non-clergy it was a break from 75 years of tradition. This meant her first few years were spent trying to prove herself. 'Not being a priest and a woman meant I didn't have a framework to run the organisation that all the rest of them had. There was a lot of work to create an organisation that stayed true to its roots but also met the needs of people who were marginalised and marginalised from church.'

She's most proud of speaking out about child poverty at a time when many didn't believe it existed, and for bringing up the issues with poverty and social housing that remain today as the organisation's biggest challenges.

 Robertson has no patience for those who judge, and who won't look at the bigger picture. 'They blame people without looking at the situation or the background. We often look at things from our own world view. I think we talk about people all the time, we don't talk to them…I guess I'm quite passionate about making sure people get a chance.'

As her next chapter draws closer,  Robertson says she feels a bit like she's leaving home to explore the big wide world. 'I'm quite excited about it but I'm quite nervous about it too, I'm not sure how it will work out. The sad part will be not being with the staff, not being part of an organisation like this.'

And though she will be working one final Christmas at the Mission this year, her family has made her promise not to be the last to leave and she in turn has promised that this will definitely be her last. 'That's my job now, but whoever is taking over the place won't want me hanging around.'